Chasidut su Michea 7:19
יָשׁ֣וּב יְרַֽחֲמֵ֔נוּ יִכְבֹּ֖שׁ עֲוֺֽנֹתֵ֑ינוּ וְתַשְׁלִ֛יךְ בִּמְצֻל֥וֹת יָ֖ם כָּל־חַטֹּאותָֽם׃
Avrà di nuovo compassione di noi; Sopprimerà le nostre iniquità; E tu getterai tutti i loro peccati nelle profondità del mare.
Kedushat Levi
It is this thought that Moses expressed in our verse when he said: “and Hashem has guaranteed you this day that this nation be a precious nation for Him, etc.”.
If you were to ask that if G’d, Who is all knowing, obviously knew all this in advance, why did He bother to create the gentile nations altogether? The answer is that G’d created the other nations לשם ולתפארת ולתהלה, “for His name, glory and splendour,” so that He would be able to glory in Israel’s accomplishments by comparison. If there were no inferior people who had started out with the same attributes as the Israelites, Israel’s accomplishments would not be appreciated as outstanding. The word: תפארת, “splendour,” is an alternate adjective used in connection with the garments of the High Priest, (Exodus 28,2) a garment worn externally, meant to reflect the inner beauty of the wearer. When the prophet Micah 7,19 speaks of G’d יכבוש עונותינו ותשליך במצולות ים, “squeezing out our sins and throwing them into the depths of the ocean,” the image before the mental eye of the prophet was that of the person laundering dirty linen, and seeing that not only the dirt has disappeared but the result being something splendid, תפארת. Showing someone how a person thoroughly soiled by his sins, has become rehabilitated is surely reason for the owner of that “garment” to boast about the “reincarnation” that has occurred, especially when it was spontaneous. This is also the meaning of Rosh Hashanah 17 where the process of removing sins is described as occurring מעביר ראשון ראשון, usually translated as “removing the sins in the order in which they have been committed starting with the first.” Our author understands this to mean that G’d had used the first sin committed by the repentant sinners as something to decorate Himself with as His first garment. It is appropriate therefore that once the sinner turns penitent, that not the last, but the original sin he has committed should be “turned inside out,” by being converted into a merit.
[When a sinner persists in sinning, the “garments” in which G’d wraps Himself, far from becoming something splendid, become symbols of His progressive distancing His essence from such a sinner, of course. Ed.]
If you were to ask that if G’d, Who is all knowing, obviously knew all this in advance, why did He bother to create the gentile nations altogether? The answer is that G’d created the other nations לשם ולתפארת ולתהלה, “for His name, glory and splendour,” so that He would be able to glory in Israel’s accomplishments by comparison. If there were no inferior people who had started out with the same attributes as the Israelites, Israel’s accomplishments would not be appreciated as outstanding. The word: תפארת, “splendour,” is an alternate adjective used in connection with the garments of the High Priest, (Exodus 28,2) a garment worn externally, meant to reflect the inner beauty of the wearer. When the prophet Micah 7,19 speaks of G’d יכבוש עונותינו ותשליך במצולות ים, “squeezing out our sins and throwing them into the depths of the ocean,” the image before the mental eye of the prophet was that of the person laundering dirty linen, and seeing that not only the dirt has disappeared but the result being something splendid, תפארת. Showing someone how a person thoroughly soiled by his sins, has become rehabilitated is surely reason for the owner of that “garment” to boast about the “reincarnation” that has occurred, especially when it was spontaneous. This is also the meaning of Rosh Hashanah 17 where the process of removing sins is described as occurring מעביר ראשון ראשון, usually translated as “removing the sins in the order in which they have been committed starting with the first.” Our author understands this to mean that G’d had used the first sin committed by the repentant sinners as something to decorate Himself with as His first garment. It is appropriate therefore that once the sinner turns penitent, that not the last, but the original sin he has committed should be “turned inside out,” by being converted into a merit.
[When a sinner persists in sinning, the “garments” in which G’d wraps Himself, far from becoming something splendid, become symbols of His progressive distancing His essence from such a sinner, of course. Ed.]
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